The first comments from Cowboys linebacker Micah Parsons about the team’s playoffs loss to the Packers came 17 days after the “embarrassing and unacceptable” loss.
Imagine how pointed his remarks might have been if he’d complied with league rules requiring all players to speak to reporters immediately after the game.
In the latest episode of his podcast, Parsons spoke about some of the issues that caused the 48-32 loss to Green Bay. In so doing, he pointed a finger directly at coaching.
“We were just outperformed, outschemed, however you want to put it,” Parsons said. “Like, they had an answer for everything. And people saying, ‘Well, why didn’t you go to linebacker? Because, you know, ‘They said you could stop the run.’ Well, guess what? The packages are in for me to go to linebacker. There’s multiple packages, multiple variations, but I can only play what is called. Whatever the call is, whatever personnel they’re putting on. I’m not putting out personnel. I’m not putting out the calls. Nothing’s coming from me, so you could put that wherever you want to be or wherever you want to put it, but they’re not coming from me.”
Parsons’s comments are candid and raw and refreshing — unless you’re defensive coordinator Dan Quinn or head coach Mike McCarthy.
It also points directly back to the decision to stick with McCarthy and not to hire Bill Belichick. Regardless of Belichick’s deficiencies regarding personnel acquisition, he would know how to scheme the defense and how to deploy Parsons and how to coach up the other players so that the Cowboys wouldn’t have to move Parsons around to conceal weaknesses elsewhere.
Earlier this week, owner Jerry Jones made it clear that he could coexist with Belichick. Parsons, intentionally or not, might be trying to speak that coexistence into existence.